Do any of you have Christina Aguilera's cell phone number?

Because right now, the only way I can ever safely show my face again in the Eagles' locker room is if I can somehow produce the pop genie -- and the rest of the sultry singing sirens of "Lady Marmalade" -- for Philly QB Donovan McNabb.

Let me explain.

During the summer I traveled to Arizona to spend some time with McNabb while he went through his unconventional off-season workout program in Phoenix. (As part of his summer regimen, McNabb, a former member of the Syracuse hoops squad, schooled a few NBA players at a local gym.) But when I spoke with Philly tight end Chad Lewis before starting on the feature in the latest issue of the Mag, he told me that although McNabb had a great sense of humor he rarely showed it to anyone outside of the team.

I had heard about the Andy Reid impression, where he hikes his shorts up to the point of suffocating himself. I understood that his mom once yelled at him, "Can't you go five minutes without crackin' a joke, just once?"

(By the way, you don't want to mess with Momma McNabb. "You can tell she is a very, very sweet lady," says Eagles kick returner Brian Mitchell. "But you get the idea pretty quick that you don't want to get her mad because she will slap you back into line quick.")

I heard how he would tease his older brother, Sean, for weeks after beating him in hoops or video games. Teammates told me about the crack-ups in the huddle during the overtime wins against Dallas and Pittsburgh.

"It helps to get guys excited about the game," McNabb told me. "If guys are smiling and enjoying what they're doing, you can get a lot more out of them."

I watched him give every kid on this practice field in the desert a nickname in five minutes. "Hey," he yelled at a lanky kid, "Michael Jackson, yeah you, man . . . beat it." Then I saw him grab a digital camera and start to shoot his own home movie. I watched as he pushed rookie wideout Freddie Mitchell to run down a long ball by saying, "It's late and I need a TD so I can get off the field and get some Gatorade." I laughed so hard I almost puked when he teased a barfing player by yelling at him, "Aw man, don't give up the kids, baby, hold on to 'em."

So I was quite tickled when, five minutes into his exhausting routine under the pizza-oven Arizona sun, McNabb spotted me cowering in the shade under the bleachers and yelled out: "YO, ESPN DUDE! YO! Get outta the shade. Man, what's wrong with you? It's too hot for Mr. Big Time ESPN Man?"

I spun around expecting to see Beano Cook behind me and when I didn't, I realized McNabb was talking to me. "Who do I get for the cover?" he yelled.

Willing to engage in McNabb's witty repartee, I fired back "Huh? Who said this was a cover?"

"Come on man, you guys let Steve Francis pose with Destiny's Child. Who do I get?"

Since it was the day after their under-dressed and oversexed performance at the MTV Movie Awards, I hollered: "I can get you Lady Marmalade, how's that?"

"Now that's what I'm talking about, Mr. ESPN."

Who was I kidding? The only thing Christina, a former Mouseketeer, and I have in common is that we have both worked for Disney and we have both shown the ability to create and maintain a career without any real discernable talent. So a few weeks later, when I saw him in Philly throwing passes with so much zip they seemed to sizzle, the first thing McNabb asked me was when the limo was picking him up for his photo shoot with LM.

He was joking.

I think.

Naw, it wasn't gonna happen, I told him.

But all was not lost.

It turns out we managed to find someone even better for McNabb to pose with for our NFL preview cover.

Himself.

David Fleming is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail flemfile@aol.com.